


Bargain

by micehell



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Drama, Gen, Odd, post-Common Ground
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-09-24
Updated: 2006-09-24
Packaged: 2017-11-12 04:11:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/486539
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/micehell/pseuds/micehell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During the course of a lifetime that had been far more eventful than he was comfortable with, Rodney had tried to do it in many different ways.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bargain

During the course of a lifetime that had been far more eventful than he was comfortable with, Rodney had tried to do it in many different ways.

Bargaining with god(s) he didn't (quite) believe in? 1,015 times. (Well, technically speaking it was 1,016 times, but he didn't count that first time he'd tasted painful death packaged in a bright yellow rind, because he'd only been two at the time, and kids will be kids.) Number of times it had worked? 0.

Trying to sell his soul to the devil that he certainly didn't believe in? 986 times. (And, okay, there was that time in Siberia, when he was at a very low point - and after drinking his vodka allotment to a pretty low point, too (that he'd maybe, sort of, half way tried to trade it for having a certain blond beg him for a date so that he could laugh in her face and tell her it was too late, but after he'd sobered up, he'd realized that that would never have worked - since he knew he'd never would have turned her down - so he didn't really count that one, either.) Number of times it had worked? 0.

Rodney had tried it in many different ways, and they'd all failed, because there was only ever him and his brain and his ability to overwrite the laws of physics to save his life, one that owed nothing to god(s) or devils.

So it was something of a surprise to be here in this clearing, having come to take home the dead or dying body of the best friend he'd ever had (and that was a lame phrase, a thirteen-year-old girl phrase, and it didn't even touch the things that lay under the snarking and the jokes, the things that had made him try bargaining yet one more time, even knowing it wouldn't work), to instead find that body perfectly healthy. Hell, healthier than it had been before Kolya had gotten his (or really the Wraith's) hands on it. (At least he hoped it was only the Wraith's, because Kolya was a bastard of the first order, and Rodney didn't want to think about anything else he might have done to John while he had him.)

Yes, bargain number 1,015 (or even 1,016) had been for this, but he'd never (quite) believed. And yes, he'd have been willing to make sales pitch 987 if he'd had any idea it would work. But then, considering what had happened, maybe he _had_ been singing a verse (metaphorically speaking) of _Sympathy for the Wraith_. Still, Sheppard's still (too) young face was a surprise, and Rodney could only wonder at what it had cost.

All Rodney knew was that he didn't care. And he, against his nature, didn't question things, for once not looking a gift horse in the mouth. Who cared how old the horse was? He'd take as many years as he could get. So while Beckett fussed over Sheppard, clucking in concern and amazement, and Gordon and Ronon loaded up the Wraith on the jumper, Rodney didn't look at the bodies in the clearing. Didn't look at the two Genii husks that Teyla and the other Marines stacked rocks around.

And he most certainly didn't look at the third body, the one that the others didn't seem to notice. He most certainly didn't see that while its hair was thinner and whiter, it was still untamable. Didn't see the sad remains of a once beautiful frame that was swallowed up in its habitual black.

Rodney never looked back at it as he followed Sheppard into the jumper, mentally emending his count from 986 to 987. And he thanked the god(s) that he didn't (quite) believe in that this time it had worked.

/this

**Author's Note:**

> So, okay, what I'd actually seen in my head when I started writing this was them flying away with the newly de-aged John, leaving behind the body of the really old John, all with the idea that maybe the de-aged one wasn't the real thing. I liked the potential of the concept (Wraith construct, group hallucination, demon, etc, etc), but then Rodney took over, and this is where it wound up, so... well, wth. ;)


End file.
